


Secret Orders

by Tel



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Barrayar, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-01
Updated: 2011-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-14 07:30:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/146875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tel/pseuds/Tel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bothari as a secret agent for Negri. Written for sabaytis for the Winterfair Open Exchange.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Secret Orders

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Тайные приказы](https://archiveofourown.org/works/146914) by [jetta_e_rus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jetta_e_rus/pseuds/jetta_e_rus), [Tel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tel/pseuds/Tel)



The room was small, but the door was large enough to get a float pallet through. The concrete walls were sheathed in steel. The floor was black tile, with only the faintest of scuff marks telling the prisoner where to kneel.

Konstantine Bothari's hands were cuffed behind his back, or he might have fought. His feet were hobbled, or he might have run. But he was mad, and he knew he was mad, and so he let them shove him to his knees.

There was an eye of Horus on the facing wall, etched in black.

"Do you wish a blindfold, sir?" The guard, behind him.

Captain Negri's voice was calm. "Let him see me."

Konstantine turned his head, earning a blow. The pupil of the eye of Horus was polished like a mirror, though, and he saw his own unshaven face, saw the man with the unholstered nerve disruptor, saw the Captain standing by the door.

Not one of the demons, this time. They sometimes wore his form.

"Sergeant Bothari. I have no use for loose cannon here."

His thoughts were starting to grow halos of pain, as he began to remember the last time he'd been here. He tried to think about women, about anything but Negri, but the memories were coming back, and he couldn't block them out, and his eyes were filled with water, and he was going to pass out...

An injection in his neck. The pain stopped.

"Your orders were very simple. The High Vor made you their pet, I made you ImpSec's weapon against their treason. This was not a license to use your own judgment. You belong to the state, and when you kill without permission you answer to me."

The demons weren't screaming at him any more. He knew who they were, now, and why he feared them. They called him paranoid, but they didn't know the voices were real, that Negri and his physicians had a power over him that he could never escape. He took a few gasping breaths.

"Vorrutyer... the drugs..."

"I don't care what Vorrutyer did. He betrayed the Emperor and he is dead. You betrayed _me_."

"Vorkosigan would have..."

"Vorkosigan is my concern, not yours. He gave you to me. Remember that. He gave you some of the scars on your back - remember that too. Understand this. If I ask you to kill him for treason you will do it."

"He's not a traitor." Konstantine's voice was low.

Negri's eyes in the mirror were hard. "Then he has nothing to fear."

The floor was cold under Konstantine's knees. He didn't speak.

"I think we are better off removing your judgment from the process entirely. You will serve no other man, not even yourself, and you will kill on my word alone."

The medical corpsmen behind Negri moved in, and Konstantine knew he was going back to Hell.

"Don't concern yourself with your orders," Negri said from the doorway. "You won't remember them."


End file.
